Daily Short Stories - Mystery & Suspense

The Amputated Arms - Jorgen Wilhelm Bergsøe

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Duration:: 38m
Broadcast on:: 17 Jul 2024
Audio Format:: mp3

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Recall 303-974-9444 to speak to a rent estate advisor today. How dangerous is it to unwrap a burger at 40 miles per hour? More so than you think. In a little over two seconds, your car can travel slightly more than 117 feet, which is the same length as 20 bicycles. Anything that distracts you while driving is dangerous. That's why driving while texting can be deadly, too. So put it down. It can wait. Don't drive distracted. Shifting is safe. A message from the Colorado Department of Transportation. The amputated arms by Jorgen Wilhelm Bergsoja. It happened when I was about 18 or 19 years old, began Dr. Simpson. I was studying at the university and being coached in anatomy by my old friend, Soling. He was an amusing fellow, the Soling, a full of jokes and whimsical ideas, and equally merry, whether he was working at the dissecting table or brewing a punch for a jovial crowd. He had but one fault, if one might call it so, and that was his exaggerated idea of punctuality. He grumbled if you were two minutes late. Any longer delay would spoil the entire evening for him. He himself was never known to be late, at least not during the entire years of my studying. On Wednesday evening our little circle of friends met as usual in my room at seven o'clock. I had made the customary preparations for the meeting, had borrowed three chairs, I had but one myself, had cleaned all my pipes, and had persuaded Hans to take the breakfast dishes from the sofa and carry them downstairs. One by one my friends arrived, the clock struck seven, and to our great astonishment, Soling had not yet appeared. One, two, even five minutes passed before we heard him run upstairs and knock at the door with his characteristic short blows. When he entered the room he looked so angry and at the same time so upset that I cried out, "What's the matter, Soling? You look as if you had been robbed." "That's exactly what has happened," replied Soling, angrily, "but it was no ordinary sneak thief," he added, hanging his overcoat behind the door. "What have you lost?" asked my neighbor, Nansen. Both arms from the new skeleton I have just recently received from the hospital, said Soling with an expression as if his last scent had been taken from him. It's vandalism. Weberstout and allowed laughter at this remarkable answer, but Soling continued, "Can you imagine it? Both arms are gone, cut off at the shoulder joint, and the strangest part of it is that the same thing has been done to my shabby old skeleton which stands in my bedroom. There wasn't an arm on either of them." "That's too bad," I remarked, "for we were just going to study the anatomy of the arm tonight." "Osteology," corrected Soling gravely, "get out your skeleton, little Simpson. It isn't as good as mine, but it will do for this evening." I went to the corner where my anatomical treasures were hidden behind a green curtain. The museum was what Soling called it, but my astonishment was great when I found my skeleton in its accustomed place, and wearing as usual my students' uniform, but without arms. "The devil," cried Soling, "that was done by the same person who robbed me. The arms are taken off at the shoulder joint in exactly the same manner. You did it, Simpson." I declared my innocence, very angry at the abuse of my fine skeleton, while Nansen cried, "Wait a moment, I'll bring mine in. There hasn't been a soul in my room since this morning. I can swear to that. I'll be back in an instant." He hurried into his room, but returned in a few moments greatly depressed and somewhat ashamed. The skeleton was in its usual place, but the arms were gone, cut off at the shoulder, in exactly the same manner as mine. The affair, mysterious in itself, had now come to be a serious matter. We lost ourselves in suggestions and explanations, none of which seemed to throw any light on the subject. Finally, we sent a messenger to the other side of the house where, as I happened to know, was a new skeleton, which the young student Raven had recently received from the janitor of the hospital. Raven had gone out and taken the key with him, the messenger whom we had sent to the rooms of the Iceland students, returned with the information that one of them had used the only skeleton they possessed to pummel the other with, and that, consequently, only the thigh bones were left unbroken. What were we to do? We couldn't understand the matter at all. Soling scolded and cursed, and the company was about to break up when we heard someone coming noisily upstairs. The door was thrown open and a tall, thin figure appeared on the threshold. Our good friend, Neil's Day. He was a strange chap, this Neil's Day; the true type of a species seldom found nowadays. He was no longer young, and by reason of a queer chain of circumstances, as he expressed it, had been through in nearly all the professions, and could produce papers proving that he had been on the point of passing not one, but three, examinations. He had begun with theology, but the story of the quarrel between Jacob and Esau had led him to take up the study of the law. As a law student, he had come across an interesting poisoning case, which had proved to him that a study of medicine was extremely necessary for lawyers, and he had taken up the study of medicine with such energy that he had forgotten all his law, and was about to take his last examinations at the age of forty. Neil's Day took the story of our troubles very seriously. Every pot has two handles, he began; every sausage two ends; every question two sides. But this one, this has three, applause. When we look at it from the legal point of view there can be no doubt that it belongs in the category of ordinary theft; but from the fact that the thief took only the arms when he might have taken the entire skeleton, we must conclude that he is not in a responsible condition of mind, which therefore introduces a medical side to the affair. From a legal point of view, the thief must be convicted for robbery, or at least for the illegal appropriation of the property of others; but from the medical point of view, we must acquit him because he is not responsible for his acts. Here we have two professions quarrelling with one another, and who shall say which is right; but now I will introduce the theological point of view, and raise the entire affair up to a higher plain. Providence, in the material shape of a patron of mind in the country, whose children I have inoculated with the juice of wisdom, has sent me two fat geese and two first-class ducks. These animals are to be cooked, and eaten this evening, in Mathiasan's establishment, and I invite this honoured company to join me there. Personally I look upon the disappearance of these arms as an all-wise intervention of Providence, which sets its own inscrutable wisdom up against the wisdom which we would otherwise have heard from the lips of my venerable friend, Soling. His confused speech was received with laughter and applause, and Soling's weak protests were lost in the general delight of the invitation. I've often noticed that such improvised festivities are usually the most enjoyable, then so it was for us that evening. Neil's day treated us to his ducks and to his most amusing jokes. Soling sang his best songs. Our jovial host, Mathiasan, told his wittiest stories, and the merriment was in full swing when we heard cries in the street, and then a rush of confused noises broken by screams of pain. "There's been an accident," cried Soling, running out to the door. We all followed him and discovered that a pair of runaway horses had thrown a carriage against a tree, hurling the driver from his box under the wheels. His right arm had been broken near the shoulder. In the twinkling of an eye the hall of festivities was transformed into an emergency hospital. Soling shook his head as he examined the injury, and he ordered the transport of the patient to the city hospital. It was his belief that the arm would have to be amputated, cut off at the shoulder joint just as had been the case with our skeleton. Damned odd coincidence, isn't it? He remarked to me. Our merry mood had vanished, and we took our way quiet and depressed through the old avenues toward our home. For the first time in its existence possibly, our veritable barracks, as we call the dormitory, saw its occupants returning home from an evening spout just as the night watchman intoned his eleven o'clock verse. "Just eleven," exclaimed Soling, "it's too early to go to bed, and too late to go anywhere else. We'll go up to your room, little Simpson, and see if we can't have some sort of a lesson this evening. You have your colored plates, and we'll try to get along with them. It's a nuisance that we should have lost those arms just this evening." "The doctor can have all the arms and legs he wants," grinned Hans, who came out of the doorway just in time to hear Soling's last word. "What do you mean, Hans?" asked Soling, in astonishment. "It'll be easy enough to get them," said Hans. "They've torn down the planking around the Holy Trinity churchyard, and dug up the earth to build a new wall. I sought myself as I came past the church. Lord, what a lot of bones they've dug out of there! There's arms and legs and heads, many more than the doctor could possibly need. Much good that does us," answered Soling. "They shut the gates at seven o'clock, and it's after eleven already." "Oh, yes, they shut them," grinned Hans again. "But there's another way to get in. If you go through the gate of the porcelain factory and over the courtyard, and through the mill and the fourth courtyard that leads out into Spring Street, there you will see where the planking is torn down, and you can get into the churchyard easily." "Hans, you're a genius," exclaimed Soling, in delight. "Here, Simpson, you know that factory inside and out. You're so friendly with that fellow Oudson who lives there. Run along to him, and let him give you the key of the mill. It will be easy to find an arm that isn't too much decayed. Hurry along now. The rest of us will wait for you upstairs." To be quite candid, I must confess that I was not particularly eager to fulfill Soling's command. I was at an age to still have a sufficient amount of reverence for death and the grave, and the mysterious occurrence of the stolen arms still ran through my mind. But I was still more afraid of Soling's irony and of the laughter of my comrades, so I trotted off as carelessly as if I had been sent to buy a package of cigarettes. It was some time before I could rouse the old janitor of the factory from his peaceful slumbers. I told him that I had an important message for Oudson and hurried upstairs to the latter's room. Oudson was a strictly moral character. Knowing this, I was prepared to have him refuse me the key, which would let me into the fourth courtyard and from there into the cemetery. As I expected, Oudson took the matter very seriously. He closed the Hebrew Bible which he had been studying as I entered, turned up his lap, and looked at me in astonishment as I made my request. "Why, my dear Simpson, it is a most sinful deed that you are about to do," he said gravely, "take my advice and assist; you will get no key from me for any such cause; the piece of the grave is sacred, no man dare disturb it." And how about the grave digger? He puts the newly dead down beside the old corpses and lives as peacefully as anyone else. "He is doing his duty," answered Oudson calmly, "but to disturb the piece of the grave from sheer daring, with the fumes of the punch still in your head, that is a different matter that will surely be punished." He is worth irritated me. It is not very flattering, particularly if one is not yet twenty, to be told that you are about to perform a daring deed simply because you are drunk. Without any further reply to his protest, I took the key from its place on the wall and ran downstairs two steps at a time, vowing to myself that I would take home an arm, let cost what it would. I would show Oudson, and Soling, and all the rest, what a devil of a fellow I was. My heart beat rapidly as I stole through the long dark corridor, past the ruins of the old convent of St. Clara, into the so-called Third Courtyard. Here I took a lantern from the hall, lit it, and crossed to the mill where the clay was prepared for the factory. The tall wheels and cylinders, with their straps and bolts, looked like weird creatures of the night in the dim light of my tallow candle. I felt my courage sinking even here, but I pulled myself together, opened the last door with my key, and stepped out into the fourth courtyard. A moment later I stood on the dividing line between the cemetery and the factory. The entire length of the tall, blackened planking had been torn down. The pieces of it lay about, and the earth had been dug up to considerable depth to make a foundation for a new wall between life and death. The uncanny emptiness of the place seized upon me. I halted involuntarily as if to harden myself against it. It was a raw, cold, stormy evening. The clouds flew past the moon and jagged fragments, so that the churchyard, with its white crosses and stones, lay now in full light, now in dim shadow. Now and then a rush of wind rattled over the graves, roared through the leafless trees, bent the complaining bushes, and caught itself in the little eddy at the corner of the church, only to escape again over the roofs, turning the old weather vein with a sharp scream of the rusty iron. I looked toward the left, and there I saw several weird white shapes moving gently in the moonlight. "White sheets," I said to myself, "it is nothing but white sheets. This drying of linen in the churchyard ought to be stopped." I turned in the opposite direction and saw a heap of bones scarce two paces distant from me. Holding my lantern lower, I approached them and stretched out my hand. There was a rattling in the heap, something warm and soft touched my fingers. I started and shivered, and then I exclaimed, "The rats! Nothing but the rats in the churchyard! I must not get frightened. It would be so foolish they would laugh at me. Where the devil is that arm, I can't find one that isn't broken." With trembling knees and a feverish haste I examined one heap after another. The light of my lantern flickered and the wind then suddenly went out. The foul smell of the smoking wick rose to my face, and I felt as if I were about to faint. It took all my energy to recover my control. I walked two or three steps ahead and saw at a little distance a coffin which had been still in good shape when taken out of the earth. I approached it and saw that it was of old-fashioned shape made of heavy open boards that were already rotting. On its cover was a metal plate with an illegible inscription. The old wood was so brittle that it would have been very easy for me to open the coffin with any sort of a tool. I looked about me and saw a hatchet and a couple of spades lying near the fence. I took one of the latter, put its flat end between the boards, the old coffin fell apart with a dull, crackling protest. I turned my head aside, put my hand in through the opening, felt about, and taking a firm hold of one arm of the skeleton, I loosened it from the body with a quick jerk. The movement loosened the head as well, and it rolled out through the opening right to my very feet. I took up the skull to lay it in the coffin again, and then I saw a greenish phosphorescent glimmer in its empty eye sockets, a glimmer which came and went. Mad terror shook me at the sight. I looked up at the houses in the distance, and then back again to the skull. The empty sockets show more brightly than before. I felt that I must have some natural explanation for this appearance or I would go mad. I took up the head again and never in my life have I so overpowering an impression of the might of death and decay than at this moment. Myriads of disgusting clammy insects poured out of every opening of the skull, and a couple of shining, worm-like centipedes, geophiles, the scientists call them, crawled about in the eye sockets. I threw the skull back into the coffin, sprang over the heaps of bones without even taking time to pick up my lantern, and ran like a haunted thing through the dark mill over the factory courtyards until I reached the outer gate. Here, I washed the arm at the fountain and smoothed my disarranged clothing. I hid my booty under my overcoat, nodded to the sleepy old janitor as he opened the door to me, and a few moments later I entered my own room with an expression which I had attempted to make quite calm and careless. "What the devil is in the matter with you, Simpson?" cried Soling as he saw me. "Have you seen a ghost, or is the punch wearing off already? We thought you'd never come. Why it's nearly twelve o'clock." What a word I drew back my overcoat and laid my booty on the table. "By all the devils," exclaimed Soling, in anatomical enthusiasm, "where did you find that superb arm?" Simpson knows what he's about, all right? It's a girl's arm, isn't it beautiful? Just look at the hand, how fine and delicate it is. Must have worn a number six glove, and there's a pretty hand to caress and kiss. The arm passed from one to the other amid general admiration. Another word that was said increased my disgust for myself and for what I had done. It was a woman's arm, then. What sort of a woman might she have been? Young and beautiful, possibly. Her brother's pride, her parents' joy. She had faded away in her youth, cared for by loving hands and tender thoughts. She had fallen asleep gently, and those who loved her had desired to give her in death the peace she had enjoyed throughout her lifetime. For this they had made her a coffin of thick, heavy, open boards. And this hand, loved and missed by so many, it lay there now on an anatomical table. And circled by clouds of tobacco smoke, stared at by curious glances, and made the object, of course, jokes. Oh, God, how terrible it was. "I must have that arm," exclaimed Soling, when the first burst of admiration had passed. When I bleach it and touch it up with varnish, it will be a superb specimen. "I'll take it home with me." "No," I exclaimed, "I can't permit it. It was wrong of me to bring it away from the churchyard. I'm going right back to put the arm in its place." "Well, will you listen to that?" cried Soling, amid the hearty laughter of the others. "Simpson so lyric, he certainly must be drunk. I must have that arm at any cost." "Not much," cut in Neil's day, "you have no right to it. It was buried in the earth and dug out again. It is a find, and all the rest of us have just as much right to it as you have." "Yes, every one of us has some share in it," said someone else. "But what are you going to do about it?" remarked Soling. "It would be vandalism to break up that arm. What God has joined together let no man put us under," he concluded with pathos. "Let's auction it off," exclaimed Dei. "I'll be the auctioneer, and this key to the graveyard will serve me for a hammer." The laughter broke out anew as Dei took his place solemnly at the head of the table and began to whine out the following announcement. I hereby notify all present that on the 25th of November, at 12 o'clock at midnight in quarter number five of the student barracks, a lady's arm in excellent condition, with all its appertinences of wrist bones, joints, and fingertips, is to be offered at public auction. The buyer can have possession of his purchase immediately after the auction, and a credit of six weeks will be given to any reliable customer. I bid a Danish shilling. One mark, cried Soling mockingly. "Two," cried somebody else. "Four," exclaimed Soling. "It's worth it. Why don't you join in Simpson? You look as if you were sitting in a hornet's nest." I bid one mark more, and Soling raised me a thawler. There were no more bids, the hammer fell, and the arm belonged to Soling. "Here, take this," he said, handing me a markpiece. "It's part of your commission as a grave robber. You shall have the rest later, unless you prefer that I should turn it over to the drinking fund. And the gay crowd ran noisily down the stairs and through the streets, until they're singing and laughter were lost in the distance. I stood alone, still dazed and bewildered, staring at the piece of money in my hand. My thoughts were far too much excited that I should hope to sleep. I turned up my lamp and took out one of my books to try and study myself into a quieter mood, but without success. Suddenly, I heard a sound like that of a swinging pendulum. I raised my head and listened attentively. There was no clock, either in my room or in the neighboring ones, but I could still hear the sound. At the same moment, my lamp began to flicker. The oil was apparently exhausted; I was about to rise to fill it again, when my eyes fell upon the door, and I saw the graveyard key, which I had hung there, moving slowly back and forth with a rhythmic swing. Just as its motion seemed about to die away, it would receive a gentle push, as from an unseen hand, and would swing back and forth more than ever. I stood there with an open mouth and staring eyes. Ice cold chills ran down my back, and drops of perspiration stood out on my forehead. Finally, I could endure it no longer. I sprang to the door, seized the key with both hands, and put it on my desk under a pile of heavy books, then I breathed a sigh of relief. My lamp was about to go out, and I discovered that I had no more oil. With feverish haste, I threw my clothes off, blew out the light, and sprang into bed as if to smother my fears. But once alone in the darkness, the fears grew worse than ever. They grew into dreams and visions. It seemed to me as if I were out in the graveyard again, and heard the screaming of the rusty weather vane as the wind turned it. Then I was in the mill again, the wheels were turning and stretching out ghostly hands to draw me into the yawning maw of the machine. Then again, I found myself in a long, low, pitch-black corridor, followed by something I could not see. A something that drove me to the mouth of a bottomless abyss. I would start up out of my half-sleep, listen, and look about me, then fall back again into an uneasy slumber. Suddenly something fell from the ceiling onto the bed, and bzzzzzzzzz sounded about my head. It was a huge fly which had been sleeping in a corner of my room, and had been roused by the heat of the stove. It flew around in great circles, now around the bed, now in all four corners of the chamber "Bzzt, bzzt, bzzt, bzzt." It was unendurable. At last I heard it creep into a bag of sugar, which had been left on the window sill. I sprang up and closed the bag tight. The fly buzzed worse than ever, but I went back to bed and attempted to sleep again, feeling that I had conquered the enemy. I began to count. I counted slowly, to one hundred. Two hundred, finally up to one thousand, and then at last I experienced that pleasant weakness, which is the forerunner of true sleep. I seemed to be in a beautiful garden, bright with many flowers and odorous with all the perfumes of spring. At my side walked a beautiful young girl. I seemed to know her well, and yet it was not possible for me to remember her name, or even to know how we came to be wandering there together. As we walked slowly through the paths, she would stop to pick a flower, or to admire a brilliant butterfly swaying in the air. Suddenly a cold wind blew through the garden. The young girl trembled, and her cheeks grew pale. "I am cold," she said to me. "Do you not see? It is death who is approaching us." I would have answered, but in the same moment another stronger and still more icy gust roared through the garden. The leaves turned pale on the trees. The flowers bent their heads, and the bees and butterflies fell lifeless to the earth. "That is death," whispered my companion, trembling. A third icy gust blew the last leaves from the bushes. White crosses and gravestones appeared between the bare twigs, and I was in the churchyard again, and heard the screaming of the rusty weather vane. Beside me stood a heavy, brass bound coffin with a metal plate on the cover. I bent down to read the inscription. The cover rolled off suddenly, and from out of the coffin rose the form of the young girl who had been with me in the garden. I stretched out my arms to clasp her to my breast, then... oh, horror. I saw the greenish gleaming, empty eye sockets of the skull. I felt bony arms around me dragging me back into the coffin. I screamed aloud for help and woke up. My room seemed unusually light, but I remembered that it was a moonlight night and thought no more of it. I tried to explain the visions of my dream with various natural noises about me. The imprisoned fly buzzed as loudly as a whole swarm of bees. One half of my window had blown open, and the cold-night hair rushed in gusts into my room. I sprang up to close the window, and that I saw that the strong white light that filled my room did not come from the moon, but seemed to shine out from the church opposite. I heard the chiming of the bells, soft at first, as if in far distance, then stronger, and stronger, until mingled with the rolling notes of the organ, a mighty rush of sound struck against my windows. I stared out into the street and could scarcely believe my eyes. The houses in the marketplace just beyond were all little one-story buildings with bow windows and wooden eaves troughs ending in carved dragon heads. Most of them had balconies of carved woodwork and high-stone stoops with gleaming brass rails. But it was the church most of all that aroused my astonishment. Its position was completely changed. Its front turned toward our house, where usually the side had stood. The church was brilliantly lighted, and now I perceived that it was this light which filled my room. I stood speechless amid the chiming of the bells and the roaring of the organ, and I saw a long, wedding procession moving slowly up the center aisle of the church toward the altar. The light was so brilliant that I could distinguish each one of the figures. They were all in strange, old-time costumes. The ladies in brocades and satins with strings of pearls in their powdered hair, the gentleman in uniform with knee-breeches, swords, and cocked hats held under their arms. But it was the bride who drew my attention most strongly. She was clothed in white satin, and a fated Mertel wreath was twisted through the powdered box beneath her sweeping veil. The bridegroom at her side wore a red uniform and many decorations. Slowly they approached the altar, were an old man in black vestments, and a heavy white wig was awaiting them. They stood before him, and I could see that he was reading the ritual from a gold-lettered book. One of the trains stepped forward and unbuckled the bridegroom's sword, that his right hand might be free to take that of the bride. She seemed about to raise her own hand to his, when she suddenly sank fainting at his feet. The guests hurried toward the altar, the lights went out, and the music stopped, and the figures floated together like pale whiteness. But outside in the square it was still brighter than before, and I suddenly saw the side portal of the church burst open, and the wedding procession moved out across the marketplace. I turned as if to flee, but could not move a muscle. Quiet, as if turned to stone. I stood and watched the ghostly figures that came nearer and nearer. The clergyman led the train, then came the bridegroom and the bride, and as the latter raised her eyes to me, I saw that it was the young girl of the garden. Her eyes were so full of pain, so full of sad and treaty that I could scarcely endure them. But how shall I explain the feeling that shot through me as I suddenly discovered that the right sleeve of her white satin gown hung empty at her side? Of the train disappeared, and the tone of the church bells changed to a strange, dry, creaking sound, and the gate below me complained as it turned on its rusty hinges. I faced toward my own door. I knew that it was shot and locked, but I knew that the ghostly procession were coming to call me to account, and I felt that no walls could keep them out. My door flew open. There was a rustling as of silken gowns, but the figures seemed to float in in the changing forms of swaying whiteness. Closer and closer they gathered around me, robbing me of breath, robbing me of the power to move. There was a silence as of the grave, and then I saw before me the old priest with his gold-lettered book. He raised his hand and spoke with a soft, deep voice. The grave is sacred, let no one dare to disturb the peace of the dead. The grave is sacred, and echo rolled through the room as the swaying figures moved like reeds in the wind. "What do you want? What do you demand?" I gasped in the grip of a deathly fear. "Give back to the grave that which belongs to it," said the deep voice again. "Give back to the grave that which belongs to it," repeated the echo as the swaying forms pressed closer to me. "But it is impossible. I can't. I have sold it. Sold it at auction," I screamed in despair. It was buried and found in the earth and sold for five marks eight shillings. A hideous green came from the ghostly ranks. They threw themselves upon me as the white fog rolls in from the sea. They pressed upon me until I could no longer breathe. Beside myself, I threw open the window and attempted to spring out, screaming aloud, "Help! Help! Murder! They are murdering me!" The sound of my own voice awoke me. I found myself in my night clothes on the window sill, one leg already out the window, and both hands clutching at the center post. On the street below me stood the night watchman, staring up at me in astonishment, while faint white clouds of mist rolled out of my window like snow. All around outside lay the November fog, gray and moist, and as the fresh air of the early dawn blew cool on my face, I felt my senses returning to me. I looked down at the night watchman. God bless him. He was a big, strong, comfortably fat fellow, made of real flesh and blood, and no ghost shape of the night. I looked at the round tower of the church, how massive and venerable it stood there, gray in the gray morning of the mist. I looked over at the marketplace. There was a light in the baker shop and a farmer stood before it, tying his horse to a post. Back in my own room everything was in its usual place, even the little paper bag with the sugar lay there on the window sill and the imprisoned fly buzzed louder than ever. I knew that I was really awake and that day was coming. I sprang back hastily from the window and was about to jump into bed when my foot touched something hard and sharp. I stooped to see what it was. I felt about on the floor in the half-light and touched a long, dry skeleton arm which held a tiny roll of paper in its bony fingers. I felt about again and found still another arm, also holding a roll of paper. Then I began to think that my reason must be going. What I had seen thus far was only an unusually vivid dream, a vision of my heated imagination. But I knew that I was awake now, and yet here lay two. No, three, for there was still another arm. Hard, undeniable material proves that what I had thought was hallucination might have been reality. Traveling in the thought that madness was threatening me, I tore open the first roll of paper. On it was written the name, "Soling." I caught the second and opened it. There stood the word, "Nansen." I had just strength enough left to catch the third paper and open it. There was my own name, Simpson. Then I sank, fainting to the floor. When I came to myself again, Neil's days stood beside me with an empty water bottle, the contents of which were dripping off my person and off the sofa upon which I was lying. "Here, drink this," he said in a soothing tone, "it will make you feel better." I looked about me wildly as I sipped at the glass of brandy which put new life into me once more. "What has happened?" I asked weekly. "Oh, nothing of importance," answered Neil's. "You were just about to commit suicide by means of charcoal gas. There are mighty bad ventilations on your old stove there. The wind must have blown them shut, unless you were full enough to close them yourself before you went to bed. If you had not opened the window, you would have already been too far along the path to paradise to be called back by glass of brandy. And take another." "How did you get up here?" I asked, sitting upright on the sofa. Through the door, in the usual simple manner, answered Neil's day. I was on watch last night in the hospital, but with eyes since punch is heavy and my watching was more like sleeping, so I thought it better to come away in the early morning. As I passed your barracks here, I saw you sitting in the window in your night shirt and calling down to the night watchman that someone was murdering you. I managed to wake up Jensen down below you and got into the house through his window. Do you usually sleep on the bare floor?" "But where did the arms come from?" I asked, still half bewildered. "Oh, the devil take those arms," cried Neil's. "Just see if you can stand up all right now." "Oh, those arms there. Why, those are the arms I cut off your skeletons." Clever idea, wasn't it? He knew how grumpy Soling gets, if anything interferes with his tutoring. "You see, I'd had the geese sent me, and I wanted you all to come with me to Thuyason's place. I knew you were going to read the osteology of the arm, so I went up to Soling's room, opened it with his own keys, and took the arms from his skeleton. I did the same here while you were downstairs in the reading room. Have you been stupid enough to take them down off their frames and take away their tickets? I'd mark them so carefully that each man should get his own again." I dressed hastily and went out with Neil's into the fresh, cool morning air. A few minutes later, we separated, and I turned toward the street where Soling lived. Without heating the protest of his old land-lady, I entered the room where he still slept, the sleep of the just. The arm, still wrapped in newspaper, lay on his desk. I took it up, put the mark piece in its place, and hastened with all speed to the churchyard. How different it looked in the early dawn. The fog had risen, and shining frost pearls hung in the bare twigs of tall trees where the sparrows were already twittering their morning song. There was no one to be seen. The churchyard lay quiet and peaceful. I stepped over the heaps of bones to where the heavy oak and coffin lay under a tree. Cautiously, I put the arm back into its interior and hammered the rusty nails into their places again, just as the first rays of the pale November sun touched a gleam of light from the metal plate on the cover. Then the weight was lifted from my soul. When it comes to renting out your property, the uncertainty of finding reliable tenants can feel like a real guessing game, responsible renter or perpetual party animal. Enter Renters Warehouse. 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